It is has been my practice for most of this year, to read a Psalm as my opening prayer in this study session. I read, or heard at some point, that if a person prays a psalm back to God, He cannot fail to answer, and so I do it, trying to make sure that He knows of my efforts to find Him in my study. It may be that I am looking for a magic bullet that will assure this happening, but the practice has yielded some gems.
But, as I think about this search for a formula of prayer and study, one that will give me insights into God, His Word, and my place in the whole scheme of things, my mind goes back to another prayer that I have associated with a sure answer.
Jan Karon, in her Mitford series books, has a character, Father Tim, who often suggests that, in times of uncertainty, we use the "prayer that never fails". What is this talisman, the certain set of words that if we utter, will cause God to bend near and hear us?
This prayer comes from Matthew 6:10 and it included in the Lord's Prayer. As translated in the King James version it reads "Thy will be done".
Praying this prayer says that the petitioner bows his knee and gives up any sovereignty in his own life to what God knows is best. It is an acknowledgment that God is in control, and I am not.
When I read in my Psalm reading for today, in Psalm 31:15 to be exact, that "My times are in Your hand", I see the same meaning.
These two prayers, one prayed by David, and the other cited by Jesus, himself, as a model, will put my life where God would want it to be, if I only pray them in sincerity from my own heart.
Can I or will I?
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